Re: Making 'eq' == 'eql' in bignum branch

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Pip Cet <address@hidden>
> Date: Mon, 20 Aug 2018 07:19:39 +0000
> Cc: Stefan Monnier <address@hidden>, address@hidden
> 
> I think references to most-positive-fixnum (and implicit ones, like
> using Frandom without an argument) should be eliminated. Fixnum range
> is now an implementation detail.

That is too radical, IMO.  Having bignums _allows_ us to write
programs that are oblivious to most-positive-fixnum's value, but it
doesn't _require_ it.  It is perfectly legitimate to want to write a
program that is sensitive to that value, e.g., because using bignums
makes some program significantly slow, and so you'd like to ask the
users whether they want to proceed regardless.  Or maybe even refuse
to do something (e.g., buffers and strings generally cannot be larger
than that).

We have other system dependent variables and constants (e.g.,
shell-file-name), and for a good reason.  Sometimes you need those so
you could actually implement a portable program.

So I don't think we want to argue for a total elimination of
most-positive-fixnum from our code.